The Baltimore County Council is moving forward with legislation that aims to reduce school overcrowding by limiting new housing projects, after overriding a veto from the county executive Monday.
Johnny Olszewski vetoed the update to the county’s Adequate Public Facilities Ordinance on June 13, saying it would hinder the county’s ability to offer affordable housing to residents. Councilmembers originally passed the bill 4-2 on June 3.
Four council members joined bill sponsor and Council Chairman Izzy Patoka on Monday night to overturn the veto. Councilman Pat Young was the only to oppose, with one member absent.
Patoka also introduced new “clarifying legislation” on Monday to resolve some of the concerns with the original bill. Details were not provided during the meeting.
“The county council is not moving forward with this action with blinders on,” Patoka said. “We had three public hearings on this. We had stakeholder meetings.”
In a statement, Olszewski called the new legislation a “Band-Aid,” resulting in a “curious and convoluted approach” to addressing the bill’s flaws.
“Tonight, the Baltimore County Council removed all doubt: Bill 31-24 is deeply flawed legislation,” the statement read. “Nonetheless, we encourage the Council to use this ‘do-over’ as a renewed opportunity to engage with BCPS leadership and housing advocates to responsibly address school overcrowding while also meeting our moral and legal obligations to expand access to attainable housing.”
Baltimore County Superintendent Myriam Rogers stood with Olszewski during his veto in early June. And Councilman Jones, who was absent at Monday’s override vote, said he filed more than 30 amendments to the original bill on behalf of the school system – none of which were accepted.
But Patoka said there was “an unusual amount of interaction” with all stakeholders.
“And so sometimes we can take an unusual path to get to the right place,” he said. “And I think that’s what we’ve done here.”
Councilman Wade Kach cast his support for the bill because of anticipated development projects in his district in coming years.
“If you go from the Hunt Valley Town Center down to the beltway, from the light rail over to York Road, that area is going to be subject to tremendous development,” Kach said. “I mean, we're talking about thousands of units, thousands. And we can't have a situation where we're going to have all these new living units and no capacity in our schools. That's irresponsible, totally irresponsible.”
The bill will create a council that reviews applications for new housing developments near overcrowded schools. It also scraps the “adjacency loophole” – which allowed housing projects to continue in overcrowded districts as long as there was a less-crowded school nearby.
